Also, Linux has had its chance to build a desktop - it had a chance with literally tons of Venture Capital thrown its way, and now the money is gone.

There's not going to be any more money to throw at it. The stock market/dot com boom is gone. The housing bubble is currently imploding. The U.S. is already in a recession (as long as you aren't a Government economist). The money is gone, and Linux could never get its act together. If there's no money now for developers to keep these projects going, there sure isn't going to be any more money coming in the next 3 years.

Linux had its chance - noone wanted to listen to adults and standardize on one desktop environment. Noone wanted to standardize on one distribution layout, and then have companies form services around THE STANDARD. If that had happened, you would be light years ahead in terms of desktop development now, and would actually have more than a miniscule share on the desktop.

Remember the insane VC's actually funding Nautilus, for millions? Insanity over a lousy file explorer! Novell wasted millions on Ximian! Now it's gone, and there's no more money. That's the reality. The debt overhang in the U.S. is unreal, and it's all coming down. Imagine what you will, but in the end money talks, and the bubble money (meaning phony Fed-created money) is history, and after every phony boom is a horrifying debacle. And people don't volunteer during debacles - they just try to feed their kids.

This might be a good essay topic: How the collapse of the housing and dot.com bubbles and the resulting recession will impact open source development over the next 5 years.